The world Chloe woke up to was nothing like the world she remembered.
The air smelled of mold and rust.
Chains rattled faintly with her every breath.
The floor was damp beneath her, cold seeping through the thin cotton of her hospital gown.
Slowly, painfully, she blinked open her swollen eyes.
She was inside a dilapidated cabin, if it could even be called that.
The walls were splintered wood and rotting beams.
Cracks in the ceiling leaked thin streaks of moonlight onto the dirt floor.
A battered metal door stood on the far side, padlocked from the outside.
A single barred window let in a sliver of light high above.
Her heart hammered against her ribs.
"Where am I?"
"Why?"
"Nate..."
She tried to sit up, but pain lanced through her side. She bit back a cry.
Her hands were raw and bruised, the skin on her wrists torn where she had struggled against the ropes that had once bound her.
They had left her here.
Like an animal.
To rot.
But she wasn't going to die here.
Not without trying.
********
The Escape Attempt
Chloe spent hours, or maybe days; she couldn't tell time anymore, studying the door, the window, every crack in the walls.
She noticed the guard, a thick, bald man with a snake tattoo around his neck, only came twice a day. Once to shove a plate of food in, once to check the locks.
Each time, he left the door unlatched for a few seconds.
She timed it.
She planned.
She waited.
The next morning, when the plate clattered into the room, Chloe forced herself to stay still, feigning unconsciousness.
The guard swore under his breath, kicking her lightly.
"Stupid girl," he muttered.
The moment he turned his back, Chloe surged forward, silent, fast.
She grabbed the edge of the heavy metal plate and slammed it against the back of his knee.
The man grunted in pain, stumbling.
She darted past him, barefoot, ignoring the burning in her feet as she ran.
The world outside was nothing but endless woods, grey, misty, cold.
Fog twisted between the trees like skeletal hands.
She didn't know where she was, but it didn't matter.
Freedom was ahead.
Hope was ahead.
Branches whipped against her skin as she ran, heart pounding like a drum in her chest.
Behind her, shouts rang out.
Footsteps thundered.
They were coming.
She didn't look back.
******
The Cliff
The woods thinned out, and suddenly she was at the edge of a cliff.
The ground crumbled under her toes.
Below, nothing but jagged rocks and the roaring river.
Her breath caught.
"No. No, not this."
She spun around and there he was.
The snake-tattooed man.
Smiling.
He wasn't alone.
Another figure emerged from the mist, face hidden beneath a black hoodie, with a feminine body, she was hiding behind the guard, hiding her face.
"Please," Chloe gasped, taking a step back. "Please don't…"
"You should've stayed put," the man sneered.
The one in the hoodie stepped closer and let out a devious smile, she had a short hair showing visible and a red scar on her right eye, she shoved her Chloe away, so hard, off the cliff.
The world tilted violently.
The sky and earth switched places.
Chloe's scream ripped through the night as she plunged over the edge.
The wind tore at her, a howling, monstrous sound.
And then…
nothing but the rush of water and darkness swallowing her whole.
The rain came down in sheets, cold and merciless, blurring the world outside Nate's windshield into gray smears.
He sat motionless in his car, fists clenched on the steering wheel, staring blindly at his phone.
It had started with a single call from an unknown number.
No words, just the sound of rushing water, distant voices shouting.
And then... silence.
An hour later, the police had shown up at his door.
He remembered the officer's face, grim and pitying.
"Mr. Armstrong," he said gently, "there's been a report. A young woman matching Chloe's description... was seen being thrown from a cliff near Pine Hollow River."
Nate's world slowed.
Stopped.
He couldn't breathe.
He couldn't move.
All he could hear was Chloe's laughter from just days ago, sweet and light, echoing in his mind.
"No," he rasped. "You're wrong."
"We're organizing a search," the officer said. "The current is strong. She might have survived... but..."
The unspoken words hit harder than any bullet.
But it was unlikely.
****
At the Riverbank
The river raged beneath a pale sky as dozens of officers, divers, and rescue teams swarmed the banks.
Searchlights cut through the mist.
Boats crisscrossed the surface.
Dogs sniffed the muddy shores.
Nate stood on the edge of the cliff, staring down into the churning water below.
Somewhere out there, Chloe had fallen.
Somewhere out there... she was either fighting to live or already lost.
He couldn't accept it.
He wouldn't.
His shoes slipped in the mud as he moved closer to the edge, desperate to see something, anything, a glimpse of her dress, her hand reaching out.
Nothing.
Just the endless roar of the river.
Hours dragged into the next day.
Still, no sign of her.
The divers surfaced one after another, shaking their heads solemnly.
"No body," one of them muttered.
"She's gone," another whispered.
Nate sank to his knees in the mud, hands digging into the earth, gasping like a man drowning on dry land.
He had failed her.
He had promised to protect her.
And now she was... gone.
*****
Later That Night
The TV news blared in the background, but Nate barely heard it.
A small part of him still clung to hope.
"Maybe she made it to shore."
"Maybe she's hiding, hurt but alive."
"Maybe... just maybe."
He stared out the window at the rain.
He would find her.
He had to.
Because without Chloe, Nate realized...
he had no life left to live.